Brainless Home Alone clone with a Cruel Twist

DON'T TELL MOM THE BABYSITTER'S DEAD (1991)

Reviewed By Jerry Saravia

I confess: I love the title of this movie. I thought for sure it was going to be a delightful black comedy about a nasty incident that could leave everyone in deep trouble. Alas, as often the case with movies that have great ideas, it all goes to hell, leaving us with a disposable teen comedy about maturing. Dead on arrival is more appropriate.

Christina Applegate has the lead role as Sue Ellen "Swell" Crandell, who at first is left to care for her three brothers and two sisters after Mom leaves for Australia for a new job! Of course, they are not left to their own devices when Mom surprises them with a mean babysitter (Eda Reiss Merin) who calls the children maggots. Well, before one starts to figure all the complications and comic frenzy that will ensue, the babysitter dies in the first ten minutes! Before you can say, well, how are these kids going to cope with this situation, the babysitter is left in front of a mortuary and cruelly placed in the luggage! And then the movie forgets there was even a babysitter as we see Sue applying for a designer job so she can take care of the family for the rest of the summer. Um, so what about the title? Why not call this "Home Alone" for the thoughtless MTV generation that, I believe, has outgrown the John Hughes formula for all it is worth by a different title? Originally, it was called "The Real World," and speaking of MTV...you see where I am going with this.

Applegate doesn't hold the big screen that well (yes, I had a crush on her at one time thanks to "Married With Children" but times change). There is one performance that works, though, and that is Joanna Cassidy as the vice president of the clothing manufacturing company that Sue works for. Cassidy is bright, elegant, engaging, but what the hell does her role have to do with the rest of the movie? Same with reliable actors like Jayne Brook, Josh Charles and David Duchovny in such thinly veiled roles that make no impression.

"Don't Tell Mom..." is the kind of movie with a solid premise that is abandoned for the sake of making yet another teen comedy about growth and maturation. The ending will be enough to make one gag at how incredulous the whole affair is. Keith Coogan, by the way, is the miscast stoner brother who, by listening to Julia Child and cutting his long hair, becomes wholesome and appealing. What universe does this movie think it belongs to?